My New Co-Worker Wears a Familiar Scent. It’s Stirring a Very … Uncomfortable Feeling in Me.

Good Job Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Giulio Fornasar/Getty Images Plus. Good Job is Slate’s advice column on work. Have a workplace problem big or small? Send it to Laura Helmuth and Doree Shafrir here. (It’s anonymous!) Dear Good Job, I have a ridiculous dilemma that is causing me genuine distress. It involves a new co-worker and the cologne he wears. I promise this is relevant: My husband smells amazing. He wears a special cologne that can only be purchased in his home country. We also have a very intense, passionate relationship, and the smell of his cologne drives me wild. Well, a few months ago, my office hired a new employee who happens to be an immigrant from the same country as my husband, and he wears that same cologne. I work closely with him on a daily basis, and the smell is making me insane. Every time I smell his cologne, I get aroused and I can’t focus on work. I’ve also developed an attraction to my co-worker, all because he smells exactly like my husband! I am trying so hard to remain professional, but I think people are starting to notice how flustered he makes me. My husband finds the whole thing hilarious and has offered to stop wearing the cologne, but I think the damage is done. It’s been months at this point, and I don’t think I’m going to get used to it. What should I do? I thought about faking an allergy and asking him to stop wearing it, but I don’t think he’d buy it because we’ve been working together for awhile now with no allergy issues. I know many offices have a scent-free policy; would it be completely insane if I started advocating for a scent-free office under the guise of inclusivity, even though I just want this one person to stop wearing his cologne? I don’t know what else to do! —Nose Woes Dear Nose Woes, Scent memory and association is a powerful thing! Way back in the 1900s, all of the hottest eighth-grade boys wore Drakkar Noir, a cologne with a very distinctive, almost cloying scent that made all the middle-school girls lose their minds. Now, in 2026, no one wears Drakkar Noir, but if I were to encounter someone wearing it out in the wild, I can’t promise that I wouldn’t immediately go weak-kneed with lust. So I feel you on this! That said, I think your instincts may be slightly off in terms of how to deal with the guy at work who’s wearing your husband’s cologne. Trying to get a scent-free policy instituted at the office because of this one dude seems like a real overreaction. I also think that, unfortunately, while you’re still working with this person, you need to break the association you have between the cologne and your husband. So I would take your husband up on his offer to stop wearing it—perhaps there’s a different cologne that he could start wearing? I also do want to gently suggest that getting aroused in the workplace because of your co-worker’s cologne to the point that your colleagues are starting to notice may be something worth interrogating. I’m not suggesting any impropriety here, or that you’ve done anything wrong, but the fact that you wrote to me because you’re seriously considering constructing an elaborate lie to get an entire office policy changed tells me that there may be something else going on here. What that is, I couldn’t say, but I do encourage you to try to be honest with yourself about whatever’s going on. —Doree Classic Prudie Several months ago, I met a nice man at a gathering of friends. We hit it off and started dating. He’s smart, funny, and sweet. He clearly adores me, and I’m starting to feel the same about him. We are both well over 40 years old. On a whim, I Googled his name and found a news article, with a photo of him, describing his arrest several years ago on a charge of soliciting a young teenage girl over the Internet for sex. There was no mention of the outcome of the case, and he’s not listed on a sex offender registry anywhere. He is divorced and his son lives with his mother. I have no children. The physical part of the relationship has been great, and he seems extremely happy to be with non-teenage me. Do I bring this up or keep it in the past, where he seems to want it? Should I out him to our friends, none of whom have young children? How do I (or should I) unlearn what I found out about this otherwise wonderful man? Never miss new Slate Advice columns Get the latest from Prudie and our columnists in your inbox each weekday, plus special bonus letters on Saturdays. Advice Workplace Jobs